BMC: Suspense over alignments remain, Cong says won''t back Sena

Mumbai, February 25

The suspense over alignment of parties for controlling the Mumbai civic body continued on Saturday, with the Congress ruling out support to the Shiv Sena which said it had not approached the party either while the BJP refusing to accept the Congress' backing.

Earlier, some Congress sources said thinking was strong in the party's state unit that it should consider the option of enabling the Shiv Sena to have its Mayor, as a tactical move to sharpen the rift between the Sena and the BJP.

Final decision would be taken by the Congress' central leadership, they said.

Neither the Sena, which emerged as the single largest party after February 21 election to 227-member Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation by winning 84 seats, nor the BJP which won 82 seats can come to power on its own in the cash-rich civic body with the `magic number' being 114.

Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam said the party will not back the Shiv Sena, contrary to the speculation.

Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis today said BJP will not have any post-poll understanding with Congress (which is in the third position with 31 seats), and also not abandon the ‘transparency’ agenda on which it had targeted the Sena during the bitterly-fought election.

"Let those who want to align with Congress do so. The BJP is a party which fights ideology with ideology. Whether we bag power (in BMC) or not, we will never go with Congress," he said.

The Sena today claimed it had 89 corporators, with some independents extending support to the Uddhav Thackeray-led party.

"I can say that we have secured the maximum number of corporators and the Mayor will be only from the Shiv Sena. The reports that we sought support from the Congress are not true," Sena leader Sanjay Raut said. — PTI